


I'm breathing, still breathing

by Marishna



Series: Drips, drops and drabbles - significant moments of insignificantness [37]
Category: teen wolf - Fandom
Genre: Dreams, Gen, Nightmares, Nogitsune, Post-Season/Series 03, Sheriff Stilinski's Name is John
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-01
Updated: 2017-05-01
Packaged: 2018-10-26 12:08:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10786461
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marishna/pseuds/Marishna
Summary: The nightmares still come.





	I'm breathing, still breathing

**Author's Note:**

> Written for a song prompt challenge for card-write on LJ for gameofcards. The song prompt was "I want to live" by Skillet.

The nightmares still come.

There's nothing Stiles can do to predict them because he's tried to head them off at the pass. He's tried warm milk, exercising before bed, not exercising before bed, a sleep journal, staying up for an entire 24 hours before falling, exhausted, into bed. He's gone to the doctor, tried melatonin and valerian, drank enough chamomile tea that he was up every hour to piss.

Sleeping pills were prescribed and Stiles filled them but they sat, untouched, on his bedside table since the day he brought them home. As frustrating and terrifying as it was to have the nightmares he could try to train himself to be self-aware in them. On the sleeping pills Stiles worried about losing all control. 

Again.

That was the thing. Sure, he didn't like the after effects of sleeping pills in general or even that he needed to take them but the idea of putting himself right back where he was when the nogitsune possessed him was…

He'd take the nightmares, thanks.

The first night he had them was shortly after things went back to normal--or as normal as life could be in Beacon Hills. He awoke screaming with his father dragging Stiles into his arms, squeezing him so tightly that Stiles could feel the pulse in John’s body.

Once Stiles calmed down he started to ask, “Is it…” but he trailed off, unable to bring himself to say the words.

Stiles shook his head and wiped the clammy sweat from his forehead. “No. Just memories of it.”

Stiles didn't need to be in a nightmare to remember what the nogitsune did with his voice and hands and mind. He could play the events back in his mind as if they were in technicolor, scenes of mayhem and murder strung together with foggy segues.

It took Stiles a while to feel comfortable in his life again, and even longer to declare, if only to himself, that he was in the driver’s seat again. If the nogitsune intended to leave behind a broken shell of a person who'd never be whole again it put up a good fight.

But it didn't anticipate fighting Stiles Stilinski and his entire pack. 

And that's really what it came down to. Alone Stiles had no doubt that he would have died and allowed his mind to be carried away. But with his dad, Scott, Lydia, even Derek and the rest of the pack he had something to fight for. He could see how the creature in his body was hurting his _family_ and it made him want to lash out, snarling like a wolf, to protect them.

So the nightmares still come. Sporadically now and sometimes with less of a hold on Stiles’ mind that leaves him groggy and disoriented. John still rushes in when he hears Stiles yelling and thrashing in his bed and does what he can to ease his son through them. 

One of these days, Stiles thinks, he's going to turn the nightmare on itself. He’ll control it, aim it, and kill it. And then the blood on his hands won’t be that of an innocent victim but instead of the demon inside.


End file.
